IC Story Thread: Ch.1,Ad.2 - The Far Reach

The waters are relatively calm. The tide is going out, which helps. And the row out to the ship would perhaps be pleasant if there wasn't the foreboding unknown surrounding the situation...

Indeed, upon your approach there is still no sign of personnel on the deck, or really the ship, as once you're close enough you hear no sounds either. There are a few ports upon each side, but they are shuttered.

And even as you proceed to climb aboard, no one appears to take notice or show themselves to impede you.

And so it is that you find yourselves upon the deck of the ship, in the mid-day sun, on a relatively pleasant day to be on the water.

The main features besides the mast and sails and various lines and stays and other sailing elements is a cargo hatch in the fore-deck - batoned shut, and a low, open cabin toward the aft. The cabin, from here at least, appears to be mostly just a shelter for the captain of the ship while under sail. It has a couple benches you can see from here and a tiller that runs back to the ships rudder.

The hatch swings open and it's hard, at first at least, to see anything but blackness below, as you look from the bright day light into complete shadow.

Nothing emerges, immediately, anyway.

And the only sound so far is the creek of timbers and the groan of stretched lines.

Soon enough, the floor boards of the hull cargo hold resolve themselves in the ambient light. There's little to see from here except straw covering much of the floor, and the remnant smell of stale feces from some manner of livestock.

It is perhaps just over a two meter drop to the floor in the hold.

There are lines hung in loose coils on the ship gunnels. And there are even a couple small cleated drums affixed to the gunnel-tops that Cirion and Seonaid would recognize as being used for tie-offs when lowering cargo into the hold.

Seonaid can relay that a boat of this size would only have need of one "tender"/smaller rowing craft. But could easily hold 2, or conceivably up to 4 possibly, but that would be really cumbersome for operation of the ship when under sail.

Dangling his head down into the hold, Turil's elven eyes have more than enough light to see what's going on below.

What he sees is fairly unremarkable.

Empty shelving on the port and starboard walls, a single door toward the fore, and a steep stair toward the aft (there must be a hatch in the floor of the open air cabin he reckons), with two doors on either side of it.

Turil finds the smell of animal is even stronger inside the confines of the hold.

Indeed there is a hatch in the very front of the open cabin, and the stairs are a much safer entry into the hold. And although only one person can fit on them at a time, you're all able to file into the hold rapidly enough, and without perturbation.

It still looks much as described before.

And Eothain is probably able to state fairly confidently that the smell is that of an ungulate. A livestock fed on hay or grasses. A different smell than that of a meat-eater for example...

With the hold being mostly empty, there is really just the single door toward the fore, and the two doors toward the aft to look into.

Based on your abilities to discern the space contained in these rooms below, by the analogous deck space above, the room beyond the door to the fore is likely the smallest. Even if the two doors to the aft lead to equally sized rooms.